Box and Teddy
by TheCapillary
Summary: Exploring the relationship Logan and Kurt have through some Christmas shopping. (Finished)
1. Part One

Logan walked through the halls of the mansion that December morning, classes had started and the halls were empty, save for a few stragglers who had slept in. The air smelled different this morning, filled with anticipation and excitement. For what, Logan couldn't begin to guess. It had only been a few months since Jean died, Logan didn't get excited over much these days, not even when one of his students misbehaved during class.

Logan gave himself an internal chuckle at that last thought. He still couldn't believe that he stayed in New York, much less stayed at Charles Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. What did Logan know about teaching? Xavier gave him what Xavier thought of an easy task of teaching the kids physical education. Really, how hard could it be?

Harder than saving the world, was Logan's conclusion. Most students, being outcasts tended to pick up outcast hobbies which consisted of playing videogames, watching TV, or reading. Most of the kids couldn't even catch a Frisbee if their lives depended on it.

"_Guten morgen, Herr Logan_." A voice came from above Logan, making him jump inside his skin and raise the hair on the back of his neck. Logan looked up to see a blue man hanging upside down from a rafter, with a book in hand.

"Mornin' Kurt" Logan replied with a nod and kept walking in the direction of the phys ed office. He didn't have a class, but Kurt didn't know that.

A few seconds later Logan heard Kurt's telltale sound of teleportation and he was in front of Logan's face with his signature purple and black mist surrounding him briefly. The noise always made Logan think of a cross between flour bag being sliced open and a person being punched in the stomach.

"Have you done your Christmas shopping yet?" Kurt asked with a large grin on his face.

_So that's what the excitement is all about_, Logan thought absently as he scratched his head.

"Er, no Kurt, haven't bothered." Logan replied and maneuvered around Kurt, but Kurt followed him.

"Why not? Christmas Day is almost here, there are a lot of people to buy presents for. You won't have enough time if you only start on Christmas Eve." Kurt said excitedly, gesturing with his arms.

"I don't do Christmas Kurt."

"But you should! Christmas is so much fun. There is laughter, and singing, and presents, and food. Oh! The food! I remember when I was with the Munich Circus there was this lady tight rope walker and the most amazing cookies were baked by her!" Kurt continued chattering down the hall, not picking up on Logan's lack of interest.

Logan stopped in front of his office and turned to face Kurt, he interrupted mid-sentence, "Look Kurt, I know you like Christmas, but just leave me out of it. Not my thing."

Kurt looked taken aback by Logan's comment, and even hurt as Logan closed the door on his nose. Logan didn't care too much, if Kurt wanted to have Christmas, there were plenty of other house guests who would be more than willing to go shopping with him.


	2. Part Two

The next few days passed, relatively uneventful, however, the excitement and anticipation was on the rise. The heightened activity and anticipation not so much as annoyed Logan as it set him on edge. His instincts led Logan to believe that something bad was about to happen within the mansion. Not that an invasion would be all that far fetched: one had happened only a few months previous. Logan was tempted to, on several occasions, to go out and patrol the perimeter, if only to calm his nerves and prove his instincts wrong.

Oddly enough though, what bothered him the most was not the hyper active and over excited kids, but that he hadn't seen much of Kurt. The only times Logan was in the same room as Kurt was during Danger Room practices and meals. If that. Logan couldn't seem to shrug off the guilty feeling and surfaced just beneath the stress and fatigue that surrounded teaching and coaching whenever he saw Kurt. Ororo had simply given him sympathetic smiles when he glanced around one morning at breakfast when Kurt had abruptly excused himself from the table.

Another feeling that seemed to surface alongside the guilt was a feeling of urgency: Logan was running out of time. Logan guessed that perhaps it had something to do with the fact that Christmas Day was only five days away and there was only a limited amount of time left to do something about the Kurt crisis.

An opportunity presented itself one morning, four days before Christmas Day to make amends. Logan walking to his office again and caught a scent of Kurt close by. He looked up to see Kurt hanging from his tail once more, reading a book.

"Mornin' Kurt." Logan said somewhat cautiously.

Kurt didn't look up from his book and didn't respond. Logan took a deep breath, "Finished your Christmas shopping yet?"

Kurt snorted, and continued to ignore him. Logan tried again, "I, uh, have a list of presents to buy. If you still have some stuff to buy I can take you and hit two birds with one stone."

Kurt seemed to hesitate, and then dropped his book from his perch. It almost fell on Logan's head. Kurt climbed down from his reading spot, "Your apologies? They are the worst I've ever heard. But I accept."

Logan felt a small wave of relief wash over him as Kurt agreed to go with him, but it's not like Logan was losing sleep over the Kurt crisis or anything.

"Hey, where are you going?" Logan demanded when Kurt started walking away.

Kurt looked over his shoulder and grinned, "Well, I can't go out without my make up on."


	3. Part Three

"_Meine liebe gute! _Logan look at all the decorations! The lights! And the midgets as elves! _Es ist so wunderbar!_" Kurt exclaimed under his wide brimmed hatand dark trench coat.

Logan winched at the volume of his exclamations, they were a little embarrassing, "Kurt, quit pointing, they'll see your hands."

"But Logan, look! They're making candy canes!" Kurt pointed and ran towards some candy factory across the hall of stores.

Logan grabbed Kurt's collar, reeling him in, "Jebus Kurt, you're not two, stop acting like you've never been to a mall before during Christmas."

"But, I haven't." Kurt replied, still with a silly grin plastered to his face, eyes wild with excitement. His white make up had started to crack a little around his mouth.

"…You haven't?" Logan asked in disbelief.

"I haven't." Kurt confirmed, "Can we go to the teddy bear shop now?"

Logan took a deep breath to calm himself down and replied rather steadily, "We'll go to the teddy bear shop as soon as we've got a couple things straight. One, keep your mittens inside your sleeve, nobody can see your hands or your make up's useless. Two, keep your head down, your make up's starting to crack. We clear?"

"Crystal. Let's go!"

Kurt bounded through the mall to the teddy bear shop called, "Vicky's Teddies" and began gathering several into his arms. Logan wasn't far behind, ignoring the stares, giggles, and amused looks being shot in his direction.

"Kurt. What. Are. You. _Doing?_" Logan hissed at Kurt and started putting the teddy bears back on the shelf that Kurt had gathered in his arms. This only prompted Kurt to keep moving along the shelves and pick more teddies.

"Logan, look at all the teddies! They are all so spectacular!" Kurt exclaimed grabbing more teddies than Logan could put back.

Logan was about to reprimand Kurt when he noticed how silent the store was. He turned around, letting Kurt chatter away to himself, and saw that everyone was staring at the two of them. Logan, for a fleeting moment, thought that they were staring at them for being the only two males in the store, but when a small girl pointed to Kurt and asked her mother why he had a tail, Logan's suspicions were confirmed: Kurt's disguise had come undone.

Kurt, in the meantime, had stopped hoarding teddies bears long enough to turn to Logan and ask, "Are we in trouble?"

Logan took a breath and nodded, "Yeah, bub, we're in trouble."

Kurt looked at Logan directly, his sun glasses slipping the down his nose, revealing his yellow eyes, and Logan looked at Kurt, raising one eyebrow. The two made eye contact briefly and then bolted. Kurt dropped the teddies and pulled off his disguise, covering up that he was a mutant was useless now.

A woman finally got around to screaming as Logan and Kurt politely pushed their way to the exit of the store with a cart already filled halfway with presents. The two ran through the mall, past various stands selling relatively useless items, and clothing stores, attempting to evade the police officers that were sure to have been notified by then.

Logan was pushing the cart in his hands so fast that every time he took a turn a present flew out of the cart.

"Hey Logan! Careful! You're losing all the presents!" Kurt complained, huffing from behind Logan.

Logan didn't care, he simply didn't want to get caught at this point. He would have liked nothing best to just leave the cart, but he knew that Kurt would never forgive him if he at least didn't try.

"It's for charity." Logan called over his shoulder, steering the cart around yet another shopping mother and child, and then in the opposite direction around a corner.

Logan was glad when the entrance of the parkade came into view. He sped up some more, he was not going to get caught in a mall.

"Logan! Wait up!" Kurt called from some distance behind Logan, "I can't run that fast!"

Logan didn't care anymore for Kurt right now than he did the presents. In fact, Kurt's constant whining was making Logan grind his teeth and increase his speed a little more. Some few, choice words would be said if Kurt would be running next to him.


	4. Part Four

Logan had come home that night of the shopping disaster frustrated and a little tired. He was glad that classes weren't running anymore as it gave him time to finally get drunk, relax, and forget about presents and gift giving without having to keep up and appearance for children. What was so special about gift giving anyway? All those useless gifts would be standing around year after year, collecting dust until they were given to someone else as gift as a way to make space for the newest dust collector. It seemed like a useless tradition.

Logan avoided Kurt for the next few days as well, he didn't want to hear one more "vere's" or "vat's" or see a tail waving around his face until Christmas was over. Logan went so far as to skip several training sessions over the holidays. Logan's excuse when questioned by Scott was "It's the holidays", although just about everybody knew that Logan didn't want to be in the same room as Kurt. An ironic twist as it was Kurt who was being avoided instead of Logan this time around.

Surprisingly though, Kurt was taking the harsh treatment from Logan well. Kept smiling, cracking jokes, and always had a twinkle in his eye. Logan didn't notice it, nor did he care, peace and quiet was basically the only thing on his mind.

Logan got his quiet, but certainly not his peace. Logan became more and more restless as the hours passed, bringing him closer and closer to Christmas Day. Logan, more often than not, found himself wondering if should have just stolen all those teddy bears and gave everybody one. Even Scott. It would have been something to ease the guilt gnawing at the back of his mind once more.

Logan lay awake on his bed Christmas Eve. He had dozed off periodically only to find himself awake starring at the alarm clock, where the time seemed to only jump forward in twenty minute intervals. 10:50, 11:10, 11:30, 11:50, 12:10, Christmas Day. Logan didn't bother trying to fall back asleep again, he knew he wasn't going to be able to. He threw his legs over the side of his bed and got up.

Logan grabbed a pack of cigarettes and a lighter before heading out of his room and downstairs, if he wasn't going to be able to sleep the night away, he could at least smoke some of it away. As Logan got to the main floor his senses became alert when rustling was heard from the main sitting area. He dropped his smokes and light and slowly and silently, popped his claws, minimizing the unsheathing sound they usually made. Logan crouched and crept along a wall towards the room, claws poised to attack and listening carefully for the rustling. Logan got to a door frame and inched as close as he could, not letting any part of himself become visible. He inhaled deeply to see if it was simply some kid who couldn't sleep and wanted to open his present early. Unfortunately, the heating system was blowing warm air in the wrong direction, preventing Logan from getting a clue as to who it could be in the other room. Logan, knowing that not much in the world could hurt him or outrun him, decided that leaping into the other room and scaring the poor sod would be the best course of action.

"AHH!!!" Logan yelled at the top of his lungs, making the person jump fifteen feet into the air, and onto the ceiling.

"AHHHH!!!!" Came the reply from a very frightened and blue man, clinging to the rafters of the main sitting room.

It took Logan a few seconds to realize that the person rummaging around the room was, in fact, Kurt. Logan breathed a sigh of relief and re-sheathed his claws, but he couldn't help but ask, "Kurt, what the devil are you doing?"

"Me!?" Kurt asked in an indignant tone, "What am I doing here? What are you doing here? What were you trying to do to me?"

"Sorry Kurt, I thought there was a troublemaker here." Logan apologized, it was an honest mistake.

"Troublemaker," Kurt muttered, shook his head, and dropped back down to the floor.

Kurt walked over to the fifteen foot Christmas tree that was propped up against the wall opposite the television. It had a mess of decorations hanging from it; most of them put up around the bottom half of the tree. There was cookie decorations Rogue had slaved over, of which most had been eaten by the end of the first week the tree had been put up. Several chains of lights had been strung around the tree, with light bulbs ranging from pink to white to green. A mass of paper decorations had been hung on the first two levels of branches. The younger students had had a craft day several weeks ago where a number of different ornaments were created, most of the asymmetrical and lacked colour coordination.

As a person looked higher up the tree, the decorations became normal and organized, with glass decorations and solid chains of lights. Logan noticed that the tree top decoration had been switched from a skinny star to an angel, with flowing red hair. Logan took a step forward to inspect the decoration closer and nearly fell as he stumbled over a box with a large bow on top of it. He picked it up and red the tag attached to it, "To: Rogue, From: Logan". Logan was too stunned to speak, he didn't buy the present.

"_Verdammter kister! Wo ist das Band?" _Kurt muttered to himself rooting through a pile of presents.

"Kurt?" Logan asked hesitantly.

"What?" He replied, somewhat irritably.

"Did you do this?" Logan asked, holding up the box.

"No, Santa Clause did." Kurt replied without looking up, this time rooting through a pile of wrapping paper, "Aha! Here it is!" Kurt held up a spool of yellow wrapping ribbon.

"Where did you get all these presents from?" Logan asked, setting the box down and walking over to where Kurt was working.

"I bought them." Kurt replied, "On "

"Kurt, that's impossible. You grew up in a circus, how do you know how to use a computer, much less know how to navigate the internet?" Logan asked suspiciously.

"I had Professor Xavier help me." Kurt replied and began fighting with the ribbon. It would not stay tied.

Logan took a deep breath, "Why are you doing this Kurt? Why are you going through all this trouble for people you barely know and are scared of you most of the time?"

Kurt let the ribbon go and stopped fidgeting, "In the circus, most of us were vary poor, and we could not buy each other gifts very often, not even for birthdays. We saved all the money we found for a Christmas present, even though it was going to be a small trinket. It showed not that we could keep up appearances, but that we thought about each other, that we were in each other's hearts. Because the worst thing in the world is not to have people curse you or hate you, but to forget about you, because that's like never having existed."

Logan couldn't quite believe what had been said had been said by Kurt. Logan forgot easily that Kurt was actually a man, close to Scott's age, but could act so childlike with his high energy and enormous optimism. But what Kurt said, it struck a cord with Logan: he had essentially not existed for years himself until he came to live and teach in the mansion.

Logan sat down beside Kurt and immediately tied the ribbon Kurt had fought with. He supposed it had something to do with the fact that he had five fingers instead of three.

The two sat in silence for a long while, not sure what to say. They worked on wrapping the numerous presents Kurt had bought, Kurt wrapping the presents and Logan tied the ribbons and then Kurt writing a tag to the gift's receiver and giver. Sometimes it was Kurt's name as the giver, other times it was Logan's name. Not that Logan objected.

When the two of them finished it was around four in the morning. The pile beneath the tree looked spectacular, with a number of presents going to every occupant in the institute. Logan felt satisfied, or rather, that was the only word he could think of to somewhat describe what he felt. Logan mused that this feeling might be the "warm fuzzies" Jubilee sometimes spoke about.

Logan looked over the scene again, "Nice work Kurt."

When Logan didn't hear a reply he turned around the room to see where Kurt had gotten off to. He didn't look far as Kurt had fallen asleep on the couch immediately. Logan found a blanket in the chair kitty corner to the couch and threw it over him.

"Merry Christmas Kurt," Logan said, and walked back to his room to fall into his own bed and finally get a good night's sleep.


End file.
